Armenians around the world commemorate 107th anniversary of Armenian Genocide

07:35, 24 April, 2022

YEREVAN, APRIL 24, ARMENPRESS. Today, on April 24th, Armenians around the world commemorate the 107th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide.

The Armenian Genocide – the systematic and premeditated killings of over 1,5 million Armenians, was perpetrated by the government of Young Turks in various regions of the Ottoman Empire beginning in 1915 during WWI.

The term Genocide was coined by Polish-Jewish lawyer Raphael Lemkin in 1944, whose family was one of the victims of the Holocaust. By defining this term, Prof. Lemkin sought to describe Nazi politics of systematic murder, violence and cruelty and atrocities committed against the Armenians in the Ottoman Empire in 1915 as well.

The first international reaction to the violence resulted in a joint statement by France, Russia and Great Britain, in May 1915, where the Turkish atrocities directed against the Armenian people was defined as “new crime against humanity and civilization” agreeing that the Turkish government must be punished for committing such crimes. 

When WWI erupted, the Young Turks government, hoping to save the remains of the weakened Ottoman Empire, adopted a policy of Pan Turkism – the establishment of a mega Turkish empire comprising of all Turkic-speaking peoples of the Caucasus and Central Asia extending to China, intending also to Turkify all ethnic minorities of the empire. The Armenian population became the main obstacle standing in the way of the realization of this policy. 

Although the decision for the deportation of all Armenians from the Western Armenia (Eastern Anatolya) was adopted in late 1911, the Young Turks used WWI as a suitable opportunity for its implementation.

There were an estimated two million Armenians living in the Ottoman Empire before the WWI. Over one and a half million Armenians were killed from 1915-1923. Those who survived were either Islamized or exiled, or found shelters in different parts of the world.

The first phase of the Armenian Genocide started on April 24, 1915 with the arrest of several hundred Armenian intellectuals and representatives of national elite (mainly in the capital of the Ottoman Empire, Constantinople) and their subsequent elimination. Hereinafter, Armenians worldwide started to commemorate the Armenian genocide on April 24.

The second phase was the forced conscription of around 60,000 Armenian men into the Turkish military, who were later disarmed and murdered.

The third phase of the genocide was the exile and the massacres of women, children, and elderly people into the Syrian desert. Hundreds of thousands of people were murdered by Turkish soldiers, police officers, Kurdish and Circassian gangs during the deportation. Others died of disease. Thousands of women and children were subjected to violence. Tens of thousands were forcibly Islamized.

Finally, the last phase of the Armenian genocide appeared with the total and utter denial by Turkish government of the mass killings and elimination of the Armenian nation on its homeland. Despite the ongoing international recognition of the Armenian Genocide, Turkey has consistently fought the acceptance of the Armenian Genocide by any means, including falsification of historical facts, propaganda campaigns, lobbying, etc. On December 9, 1948 the United Nations adopted the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, according to which, genocide is defined as an international crime and the signing states are obliged to prevent, as well as punish the perpetrators of the genocide.

The fact of the Armenian Genocide by the Ottoman government has been documented, recognized, and affirmed in the form of media and eyewitness reports, laws, resolutions, and statements by many states and international organizations. The complete catalogue of all documents categorizing the 1915-23 widespread massacre of the Armenian population in Ottoman Empire as a premeditated and thoroughly executed act of Genocide, is extensive.

Below is a brief list of those states and organizations, provincial governments and city councils which have acknowledged the Armenian Genocide

 

Parliamentary Resolutions, Laws and Declarations

 

 

International Organizations 

 

 

Provincial legislative bodies, governments, city councils

 

US states

Australia

Argentina

Canada

Switzerland

Great Britain

Italy 

Spain 

Belgium

Austria

Ukraine

Mexico


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